Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and psuchichē diathesis

16 Pages·2006·0.32 MB·English

by  Keith Allan

Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and
psuchichē diathesis
Keith Allan
Linguistics Program, SLCL
Bldg 11, Monash University
Vic 3800

[email protected]
http://www.arts.monash.edu.au/ling/staff/allan

Abstract
The Alexandrian grammarian Apollonius (c 80–160 CE) proposed that ‘every mood may be
paraphrased using an infinitive as the generic name of the verb’ (Peri Suntaxeōs 1: 51). As Householder
1981 recognized, this interestingly foreshadows the since discredited ‘performative analysis’ of Ross
(1970) and others; but it is still worth reconsidering Apollonius’s analysis. Although specifically
presented in a grammar of Ancient Greek, it has relevance for the grammar of today’s English and,
mutatis mutandis, other languages too.
To transfer the Apollonian idea to English is problematic. Apollonius wrote of mood, but I would
agree with Palmer (2001, 2003) that English does not have a category of mood. Instead English (like
many other languages including Greek) recognizes a realis–irrealis split that correlates with different sets
of clause-types. To oversimplify, in English, indicatives are typically realis; imperatives, infinitives,
hypotheticals, futures, deontics, complements of mandative and optative predicates are irrealis.
Apollonius used no term that systematically corresponds to clause; so we take a liberty by construing
what he says about mood in Greek to correspond to certain facts about clause-types in English. However,
if we suppose the Greek moods to represent clause-types (which is not implausible), the parallels between
the grammars of the two languages (in the area of interest) are explicable.
Apollonius links each mood to a psuchichē diathesis “mental disposition” which Apollonius
represented by such underlying ‘verbs in the indicative mood’ as I declare, I bid you is reinterpretable in
today’s terms as a mood-like operator in semantic structure; his infinitive complements as underlying
propositions. For example, where T is the declarative PI (primary illocution) operator and Φ is a semantic
representation of the proposition in I’ll see you at 10: T[Φ]; where I is the imperative PI operator, F is a
semantic future operator, and Φ is a semantic representation of the proposition in Be warned!: I[F[Φ]]..

Keywords
Apollonius, Clause-Type, Declarative, Expressive, Illocutionary Force, Imperative,
Interrogative, Irrealis, Mood, Primary Illocution, Realis, Subjunctive
Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and psuchichē diathesis 2/16

The Syntax of Apollonius Dyscolus (c 80–160 CE) is a magnificent tour de force that
argues for the semantic basis of grammar, while still paying close attention to formal
aspects of the object language. It is principally an exposition of the language structures
found in classical Greek literature and in first century Greek. Its aim is to bring students
to recognize the regularities that Apollonius perceived in the morphosyntax of the
language and for which he offered rational explanations. The regularities often underlie
a less regular surface structure which is derived by transformation from semantically
based underlying structures.
Apollonius believed that linguistic phenomena are ordered according to knowable
rational rules of grammar; and that knowing these rules is a better guide to correct
language understanding and production than merely observing the usage of either poets
and dramatists or ordinary speakers. There is a precursor here of the Chomsky 1965
distinction between competence and performance: in the view of Apollonius, authorities
may disagree on what counts as proper usage; also everyone has gaps in their
knowledge. Consequently it is knowledge of the rational analysis that provides a firm
basis for decision and allows one to spot errors in usage. Cf. (1).
(1) Just as the utility of the literary tradition is very great for correcting both the texts
of poems and the usage of everyday speech, and determining the application of
words among classical authors as well, in the same way also our present
investigation of grammaticality will provide a rational correction for all sorts of
errors. (Apollonius On Syntax (Peri Suntaxeōs) from The Syntax of Apollonius
Dyscolus (1981) Trans. by Fred W. Householder. Book I: 60)
According to Householder 1981: 17 (thinking in terms of post Chomsky 1965
grammar) ‘Apollonius Dyscolus was the inventor of the abstract base.’ On Syntax
apparently justifies this claim. It is certainly true that Apollonius proposes underlying
constructions which explicitly represent meaning using constructions that are in various
ways distinct from the normal surface sentences of Greek; his underlying constructions
need to be transformed into surface structure by epenthesis, rearrangement
(huperbaton), ellipsis and substitution (enallagē). The use of such transformations in
etymologies probably predates Plato; but Apollonius seems to have developed the
concept. And some of his proposed underlying structures bear a close resemblance to
analyses independently proposed in the late 20th century. For Apollonius the underlying
structures are the regular and correct grammar from which both ordinary speech and
poetry derive – though poets typically make more transformations than the ordinary
language user. For instance he insists that the protasis of a conditional (sunaptikos)
logically precedes the apodosis, thus conditional ei “if” and para-conditional epei
“since, when” etc. are logically sentence initial even in (2).
(2) phōs estin ei hēmera estin
light is if day is
“It’s day if it is light”
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Of which he says (3):
(3) For it is only in the surface order [sunthesis] that ei hēmera estin [in (2)] stands
second, not in the explicit semantic structure [diexodikē epangelia]. For the mind
must first accept the thought it is day, and then it can accept it is light. So never
can we agree that the conditional particle ei is not sentence initial [semantically]
even though it may sometimes occur later in the sentence. (II: 77)
Apollonius makes intriguing analyses of verbs and their subcategories. His most
interesting insight was recognizing that each mood or clause-type has a psuchichē
diathesis “mental disposition”, which Householder 1981 correctly identifies as
illocutionary force and I refer to more particularly as the primary illocution of a
clause-type.1 (4)– (7) quote some of things that Apollonius writes on the topic.
(4) [E]very mood may be paraphrased using an infinitive as the generic name of the
verb. For example if we have a declarative sentence peripatei Truphōn [“Tryphon
is walking”] we can turn it into a report of the utterance by adding the verb
implicit in the indicative mood, namely hōrisato [“He declared”], giving hōrisato
peripatein Truphōna. And similarly for the optative form peripatoiē Truphōn
[“May Tryphon walk”]. Here too one may supply [the verb] inherent in wishing,
and say ēuxato peripatein Truphōna [“He wished for Tryphon to walk”; see also
On Syntax III: 95]. And similarly for the imperative mood peripateitō Truphōn
[“Let Tryphon walk”] one would say prosetaxe peripatein Truphōna [“He ordered
Tryphon to walk”]. (I: 51).
(5) The Homeric practice of using the infinitive form by hypallage for the imperative
construction, I think, is also explained by its generality, the fact that all special
[moods] can be transformed into infinitives. (III: 63)
(6) But infinitives, since they [unlike finite verbs] have not yet acquired subject
persons, naturally also have no expression of the mental attitudes of those persons.
(III: 59)
(7) [Because the infinitive] has no mental attitude [illocutionary force] it cannot be
blocked from occurring with all moods [enclisis] with the addition of words
signifying the characteristic mood; and conversely every mood can be converted
into the infinitive. For graphē [“Write!] can be equated to graphein soi prostassō
[“I bid you write!”] where we necessarily add the bid which is implicit in the
imperative along with the pronoun [you]. For the infinitive has no share in either
of these [mood or person]. Peripatoiēs [“May you walk!” is equivalent] to
euchomai se peripatein [“I pray you walk!”], and grapheis [“You are writing”] to
horizomai se graphein [“I declare that you are writing”]. The conversion
[metalēpsis] is obvious also [in reports]: graphoi Dionusios [“Would that
Dionysius write!”] goes to ēuxato graphein Dionusion [“He prayed for Dionysius

1. There is some overlap between mood and clause-type and mood was mistakenly identified as the
semantics of clause-type in Allan 2001, but they are distinguished here and in Allan 2006.
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Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and psuchichē diathesis 4/16
to write”], and graphēto Dionusios [“Let Dionysius write!”] to prosetaxen
graphein Dionusion [“He gave the order for Dionysius to write”]. (III: 25; see
also III: 612)
In passages like these Apollonius foreshadows an analysis that reappeared some
1800 years later in Ross 1970: 261 as ‘Every deep structure contains one and only one
performative as its highest clause’ causing it to be known as ‘the performative
analysis’.3 The postulated deep structure was (8) which is not quite the same as what
Apollonius wrote of: for instance in (4) Apollonius uses a third person subject rather
than first person; and he certainly had a less sophisticated notion of illocutionary force
than obtained in the late 20th century. Nevertheless his depth of insight is salutary. It
gives him the basis for writing of negation in (9).
(8) I⁀PERFORMATIVE⁀you⁀S
(9) [The indicative mood] contains the force of affirmation [kataphasis]. And this is
why the so-called negative adverb of denial [ou(k)], which has the force of
fighting the yes assertion, regularly accompanies the indicative mood [horistikē
enklisis] in order to reject the inherent affirmation: ou graphei [“Not he is writing”
(I deny that he is writing)], ou peripatei [“Not he is walking” (I deny that he is
walking)].’ The imperative and optative take the prohibitive particle mē instead of
ou(k). (III: 90)
(9) combines the Stoic account of sentence negation, which is the direct ancestor of
modern semantic accounts of negation, with Apollonius’s own account of the
illocutionary force implicit in each clause-type.
To transfer the Apollonian idea to English is problematic. Apollonius wrote of mood,
using the rather general term enklisis. However, I agree with Palmer (2001, 2003) that
English does not have a category of mood. There is instead firm evidence that English,
like many other languages (including Greek), recognizes a realis–irrealis split that
correlates with different sets of clause-types. To oversimplify: in English, indicatives
are typically realis; imperatives, infinitives, hypotheticals, futures, deontics,
complements of mandative and optative predicates are irrealis. Apollonius used no term
that systematically corresponds to clause; so we take a liberty by construing what he
says about mood in Greek to correspond to certain facts about clause-types in English.
However, if we suppose the Greek moods to be (at least in part) signalled by clause-
types – which is not implausible – the parallels between the grammars of the two
languages in the area of interest are explicable.

2. ‘Just so every mood is transformed into [metalambanetai] nothing else but an infinitive plus a word
conveying the meaning of the mood, as when we say peripatiō [“I am walking”] equals hōrisamēn
peripatein [“I declared I was walking”], peripatoimi [“I hope to walk”] equals ēuxamēn peripatein [“I
prayed I would walk”], peripátei [“Walk!”] equals prosetaxa peripatein [“I gave orders to walk”].’
3. There is more detail on the performative analysis and its flaws in Allan 1986 8.10.3, Allan 1994c and
works cited therein.
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Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and psuchichē diathesis 5/16
Apollonius links each mood to a psuchichē diathesis “mental disposition”4 which I
have already said seems to correspond to my notion of primary illocutionary force. If
we identify the semantic properties (rather than pragmatics) of each clause-type in
terms of the typical primary illocution (PI) of the clause-type, the facts of English and
Ancient Greek are explicable in similar terms. Recognizing the clause-type is the first
step towards discovering the illocutionary point of an utterance via the PI. It is
important to reaffirm that the PI is the semantic property of the clause-type. The point I
am belabouring is spelled out in (10).
(10) The primary illocution (PI) of I’ll see you at 10 is a statement (with its potential
truth value); the statement makes a prediction about the speaker’s future
behaviour which, entering the pragmatic domain, constitutes a commissive; in
turn this commissive may be a promise or a threat depending on several
contextual factors. The PI is the crucial semantic basis for the pragmatic
inferencing that leads to the illocutionary point.
A degree of coincidence between clause-type and illocutionary force has been
recognized by grammarians in the western classical tradition since about the time of
Protagoras (490–420 BCE, Diogenes Laertius 1925 Book IX).5
The western classical tradition identifies three moods: indicative, subjunctive,
imperative. Jespersen describes these respectively as the ‘fact-mood’, the ‘thought-
mood’, and the ‘will-mood’, cf. (11).
(11) [T]hey express certain attitudes of the mind of the speaker towards the contents of
the sentence, though in some cases the choice of a mood is determined not by the
attitude of the actual speaker, but by the character of the clause itself and its
relation to the main nexus on which it is dependent [i.e. it is grammatically
conditioned]. (Jespersen 1958: 313; and cf. Jespersen 1909–1949 VII: 623)
This ternary division does not work for English because either there is no subjunctive,
or else subjunctives are also found within indicatives. Furthermore, Protagoras split the
indicative into interrogative and declarative moods. Based on the classical languages of
the European grammatical tradition, Palmer 2001; 2003 recognizes only two moods:
indicative and subjunctive which he compares with the realis–irrealis division proposed
for some Native American and Papuan languages; and also with the assertive–non-
assertive division.6 Although Palmer identifies only two moods, he discusses interrog-
atives, imperatives, jussives, prohibitives, exclamatives, and a few other mood-like
categories; but he fails to clarify their status with respect to one another, or with his

4. Apollonius’s ‘mental attitude’ is a precursor to the ‘expressed psychological state’ in Searle 1975 and
the notion of Speaker’s ‘attitude’ in Bach and Harnish 1979.
5. See Sanctius 1585, Lancelot 1644, Lane 1700, Whitney 1888, Sadock 1974, Van Valin and LaPolla
1997, Huddleston and Pullum 2002.
6. Cf. Chafe 1995, Mithun 1995; 1999; Roberts 1990; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech et al. 1985, Wierzbicka
1988, Lunn 1995.
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Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and psuchichē diathesis 6/16
binary mood system. Palmer denies that English has a subjunctive; but other scholars
would disagree.7 Whatever stance one takes, the relationships among clause-types (and
corresponding subsentences), moods and illocutions are controversial. English does not
fit a binary system of mood any better than it matches a ternary system. In fact the
traditional term mood does not adequately fit what we find, even if we were to admit a
plethora of minor moods.8 To sidestep controversy, I discuss hypotheticals rather than
subjunctives and primary illocution rather than mood; and whereas Palmer focuses on
the morphosyntactic definition of mood, I focus on the distinctive semantic property of
a clause-type, namely the primary illocution.
Palmer quotes with approval Mithun’s (1999: 173) characterizations of realis (+R)
and irrealis (–R), quoted in (12).
(12) The realis portrays situations as actualized, as having occurred or actually
occurring, knowable through direct perception. The irrealis portrays situations as
purely within the realm of thought, knowable only through imagination.
Cross-linguistically there is a cline between a basket of overlapping categories
indicative/realis/assertive at one pole and another basket comprised of such categories
as subjunctive/hypothetical//uncertain at the other.9 All languages have a declarative as
the most frequent and least marked clause-type; here in this paper its PI is symbolized
T, because its token potentially bears a truth value. The declarative is typically +R
(though it may include a hypothetical, H, as we shall see). At the opposite extreme are
hypotheticals, counterfactuals, intensionals, traditional subjunctives, and other –R
categories for which there is often no unique morphology; to quote Givón 1994: 277 on
the subjunctive ‘an air-tight, categorial definition … remains an unrealistic goal.’10
Between the extremes of +R and –R are strung interrogatives, imperatives, negatives,
futures, and habituals which may align with either +R or –R categories. For instance the
negative clause Jim is not here describes an event that can be seen as a factual statement
having a truth value; and therefore aligned with T, +R; alternatively, it is a counter-fact
aligned with –R categories. A question Who is that? has no truth value (*It is true that
who is that), thus it can align with H; but in the western classical tradition it is
indicative and aligned with T. In this short article, it is unrealistic to force all languages
into a universal mould any more specific than that already described; so the focus is on
English (with the occasional aside on Apollonius’s Greek). The –R categories in
English include:
• Futures (F)
• Imperatives (I)

7. Cf. Palmer 2001: 104, 201f; Palmer 2003: 3f versus Jespersen 1958, Jespersen 1909–1949; 1958 VII,
§18, Givón 1994, Övergaard 1995, Huddleston and Pullum 2002.
8. As in e.g. Harnish 1983, Harnish 1994.
9. Cf. Givón 1994, Wehmeier 2004.
10. Jespersen (1958: 318) writes: ‘we regard the indicative as the mood chosen when there is no special
reason to the contrary, the subjunctive as a mood required or allowable in certain cases varying from
language to language.’
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Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and psuchichē diathesis 7/16
• Infinitives (V and to V)
• Complements of mandative and optative predicates
• Deontics11 (must, ought to, should)
• Hypotheticals (H)
The future is –R because it is not, in Mithun’s words, ‘actualized, as having occurred or
actually occurring, knowable through direct perception’; that is why in many languages
the future, especially less certain futures, are marked by a modal. However the future is
not subjunctive: the irreality is temporal rather than other worldly, i.e. the world remains
constant.12 With deontics and hypotheticals the irreality is a different world wh
accessible from the world in which the utterance takes place, w0, but none the less
hypothetical. Although these brief explanations oversimplify the distinction between
different types of irreality, they serve to show why different –R properties are
differently signalled.
What criteria identify clause-type? Word order distinguishes declarative He is tall
from interrogative Is he tall? Morphosyntactic marking distinguishes the hypothetical
backshifted modal in the temporally non-past Could you mail this letter for me? from
the indicative Can you mail this letter for me?, and these two interrogatives from the
declarative I can certainly mail it for you. Intonation distinguishes declarative from
interrogative versions of John’s gone to New York(./?) Similarly in other languages: in
Navajo, the imperative has the same morphosyntax as the declarative, but is
prosodically distinct; in Korean, declarative, interrogative, imperative and propositive
(let’s constructions) are morphosyntactically identical in intimate and polite speech
levels, but are distinguished by prosody. In addition to prosodic marking, the
interrogative John’s gone where? is lexically marked by the wh- word at the questioned
location. Lexical marking is significant in identifying interrogatives in subordinate
clauses: She asked how/whether/if John had travelled to New York.
Many (uttered) subsentences (clause fragments whose missing constituents are
recoverable from context) clearly function like well-established clause-types. It is
prosody (or its typographic counterpart) that distinguishes interrogative John? [Is that
you?] and imperative JOHN! [Come in at once!] from each other and from declaratives.
An utterance of the name John in answer to Who’s that? must be judged declarative on
prosodic and contextual grounds. The clipped clause If only! is judged hypothetical on
lexical and perhaps also contextual grounds. Such subsentences seem intuitively to
function like distinct clause-types and to have distinct PIs.
Clause-type is formally defined by morphosyntax, lexis, and prosody. In all
languages, declaratives are the most frequent and least marked of all clause-types. The
semantics of a clause-type is its primary illocution (PI). All languages have a
declarative as the most frequent and least marked clause-type; here its PI is symbolized

11. Given that there are various interpretations of modality terms like ‘root’, ‘epistemic’ and ‘deontic’
meanings, I use them as defined in Allan 2001: 358–65.
12. For example if the start world and time is w0,t0 the future is w0,t1 where t1≻t0.
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Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and psuchichē diathesis 8/16
T, because – as I have said – its token potentially bears a truth value when used by a
speaker in an utterance in a certain context. There are examples of declaratives in (13).
(13) He just wouldn’t stop whingeing. Bill was shot by Max. Bill, Max shot. Bill
died. Max gave the Salvos a donation. It’s snowing is a declarative sentence.
Mortgage rates down at last. Dunno who did it.
Because the declarative is the default clause-type, the clearest definition is semantic.
The primary illocution of a declarative is defined as in 0.
(14) <form> T[Φ] an assertoric clause or subsentence such as (13). The typical
prosody involves downdrift.13
<description> Speaker says that Φ. Declaratives potentially have truth values.
<precondition> Speaker has reason to believe that Φ.
<illocutionary Speaker reflexively intends the utterance of the clause to be
intention> recognized as a reason for Hearer to believe that Speaker has reason
to believe that Φ. (Notice Speaker’s purported commitment to the
truth of what is being said.)
T is the declarative PI operator. Recognition of the form of the clause-type leads to its
identification in the description. A precondition, more or less the Austin 1975
‘preparatory condition’, is part of one’s knowledge about the proper grounds for
uttering a declarative clause (and therefore includes Speaker’s presuppositions). The
illocutionary intention of a declarative arises directly from Speaker’s use of this clause-
type, given the precondition. The primary illocution here is ‘declarative’, which is not to
be confused with a ‘declaration’: the declarative performs an act of saying; a declaration
performs acts of declaring such things as legal verdicts and umpiring decisions, or
effecting states of affairs such as marriage, job appointment, etc. Declarations are
expressed through declaratives; (15) is from a property sale contract in which deontic
shall is used to identify legally binding conditions.
(15) The rents and profits of the property hereby sold shall belong to the Vendor up to
and including the date of possession and thereafter to the Purchaser and shall be
dealt with as follows ....
I shall not further discuss declarations, see Searle 1969; Searle 1975, Allan 1994b.
The definition of declaratives refers to Speaker’s reflexive intention. In the canonical
speech event, there is an assumption that Speaker intends to communicate with Hearer;
following Bach and Harnish 1979, I call this ‘the communicative presumption’. As
recognized by Grice 1957; 1968; 1969, the intention is reflexive: it is Speaker’s

13. In certain contexts, especially in some dialects, high rise terminals occur; for conditions on these see
e.g. Allan 1984 and references cited there, also Horvath 1985.
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Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and psuchichē diathesis 9/16
intention to have a person in earshot recognize that Speaker wants him or her to accept
the role of Hearer and therefore be an (or the) intended recipient of Speaker’s message
and consequently react to it. More precisely, Speaker’s reflexive intention towards
Hearer is the intention to have Hearer recognize that, when uttering U in context C,
Speaker intends U to have a certain effect on Hearer partly caused by Hearer
recognizing that Speaker has the intention to communicate with him or her by means of
U.14 So, when Joe hears Sue talking in her sleep, he will not assume she has a reflexive
intention towards him, and therefore not expect that she intends her utterance to have
any effect on him – though she might unintentionally keep him awake. There are
innumerable mental, emotional, and physical effects that speakers might wish to
produce, for instance persuading Hearer to an opinion, intimidating Hearer, alerting
Hearer of danger, getting Hearer to do something by means of a suggestion, a hint, a
request, or a command. Speaker tailors the utterance to suit Hearer, taking into account
the presumed common ground15 and what s/he knows or guesses about Hearer’s ability
to understand the message s/he wants to convey.
The fact that declaratives potentially have truth values is the principal way to
positively identify them (which is why they are said to be ‘assertive’, cf. Quirk,
Greenbaum et al. 1985, Wierzbicka 1988, Lunn 1995, Palmer 2001, 2003). In English,
T[Φ] can be glossed It is true / false that Φ. A declarative illocution is the PI (the
primary illocution) and not the illocutionary point of an utterance. This is clear from
declaratives that issue directives, as in (16).
(16) a. I’m asking what your name is.
b. I’m telling you to stop making that noise!
In fact, there are few illocutionary points that cannot be achieved using a declarative.
Performatives (cf. Austin 1963; Austin 1975, Allan 1994a) like those in (17) have the
primary illocution of a declarative.
(17) a. I promise to be good.
b. You are prohibited from smoking.
How does this analysis connect with that of Apollonius? It appears that T[Φ] is an
alternative formulation to that exemplified by Apollonius in (18).
(18) horizomai se graphein
I.declare you to.write
“I declare that you are writing”.
The difference is that Apollonius lexicalizes the PI operator T just as Haj Ross and
others were to do in the so-called Performative Analysis, representing it as a main
clause as one has to do to spell out the meaning of the abstraction T in the words “it is
true that”. Where I propose the abstraction Φ, Apollonius, in a more user friendly

14. There is input here from Récanati 1987.
15. As defined in Allan 2001.
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Interpreting Apollonius Dyscolus on mood and psuchichē diathesis 10/16
manner, uses the infinitive graphein. Applying my analysis to his sentence gives (19),
which is closer to surface structure than (18).
(19) T[grapheis]
T[you.write]
it.is.true.that [you.write]
“You are writing”
Instead of paraphrasing the meaning of the clause-type (or mood) in terms of the object-
language, (19) takes an operator from the metalanguage and keeps the original
declarative sentence more or less intact. Thus on grounds of simplicity (19) should be
preferred to (18). However, we shall see that this is not so feasible with some other
clause-types. As alternative analyses, however, both offer descriptive and explanatory
adequacy.
Unfortunately Apollonius does not discuss interrogatives in terms of mood, so we
shall come back to him shortly. English interrogative clauses are exemplified in (20).
(20) Will you stop whingeing? Care to come along? Which came first? The
chicken or the chicken nuggets? Why bother? After all, who wants to crash a
convivial high by spending an hour at the sink? I shouldn’t have worn those
heels today, should I? He’s not bad, huh? Please may I be excused? You
were where on the night of eighteenth May?
The PI of interrogatives is shown in Error! Reference source not found..
(21) <form> Q[Φ]. Lexical markers such as post clausal English eh?, clause
final Japanese ka, English wh- words, if and whether in
subordinate clauses, and/or morphosyntactic markers such as
subject–auxiliary inversion in main clauses. Because rising
intonation typically marks orientation towards Hearer,
interrogatives typically display updrift.
<description> Speaker asks Hearer something – makes a request (cf. Allan
1986; questions are requests for information to be delivered
verbally). There is a purported option for the Hearer to refuse (or
plead inability) to comply.
<precondition> Speaker purportedly believes that Hearer can or might be able to
respond appropriately to what is asked in the clause.
<illocutionary Speaker reflexively intends the utterance of the clause to be
intention> taken as asking Hearer something.
The purported option for the Hearer to refuse or plead inability to comply distinguishes
interrogatives from imperatives – which purportedly offer no such option. These
different options are what make interrogatives (askings) ‘more polite’ than imperatives
(tellings) – but the pragmatics of the comparative uses of interrogatives and imperatives
are too complex to be adequately discussed here.
Selected Papers from the 2005 Conference of the Australian Linguistic Society. Edited by Keith Allan. 2006.